Thanks to efforts of the Vietnamese fin swimming squad, Viet Nam grabbed two gold medals last night and pushed the country to the top of the Asian Indoor Games’ medal tally.

Proud moment: Vietnamese women fin swimmers show the gold medals they won in the 4×200m surface relay last night at the Ha Noi’s Aquatic Sports Palace. The hosts finished three days of competition with four gold medals, playing a key role helping Viet Nam rank top in the medal tally.

The host team led by Trang stole the show at the beginning of the race. She had little difficulty creating favourable conditions for her teammates and was able to secure a gap of nearly two seconds after the first 50m of the race.

The second gold went to the men’s fin swimming team in the 4×100m surface relay event.

Although the team was not a top seed in the event, the Vietnamese swimmers beat out the Japanese team to take the gold. This was the fourth gold medal for Viet Nam in fin swimming.

In other news, the beishi (lion dance) team of Viet Nam made a great performance yesterday, November 2, to take the 15th gold medal for the host yesterday.

With 9.250 points, Viet Nam defeated Hong Kong and Macau (9.150) to top the event which is organised in AIG for the first time.

Ealier, the women’s hoop sepak takraw team lost 570-590 to Thailand in the finals to get a regrettable silver medal at Ha Noi’s Ha Dong Gymnasium. The men’s team in the event were beaten in the semi-final rounds and shared their third place medal with Iran.

As the two reigning global powerhouses in sepak takraw, Viet Nam and Thailand exhibited their dominance in the qualifying rounds, where they beat their opponents with remarkable might.

However, Thailand has always been a difficult rival for Viet Nam in this event. In the women’s final the Thai squad started their 30-minute game off well by scoring point after point and maintained their lead for most of the match.

Viet Nam, as usual, had a slow start, but thanks to the support of hundreds of home fans they caught up with Thailand at the 340 point mark. The teams remained competitive until the 590 point mark, when the Thai squad was able to pull away with the victory.

The Thai men’s team also ended up snagging the gold in the event after beating Indonesia 920-680.

Nguyen Le Van was able to secure another silver medal for the country in the e-sport competition. Van, who many fans expected to bring home a gold in the event after his outstanding performances in the previous rounds, lost 0-2 to He Xuebin of China in the “need for speed” event.

In total yesterday, Viet Nam was able to pocket one bronze and two silver medals.

The pressure to bring home the gold proved to be too heavy for Hang, which resulted in her poor performance and a second place finish.

Marathon runner Bui Thi Hien finished second in the women’s 3,000m with a time of 9min 37.17sec. She now has two silver medals from AIG. She won her first silver medal in Macao two years ago.

SEA Games champion, Vu Van Huyen, won a bronze medal in the men’s heptathlon. Despite a third place finish, Huyen, who had been perceived by several observers to be out of contention for placement in the event, surprised his coaches by snagging the bronze medal.

The last silver of the day went to Tran Bao Thu in the fin swimming event. Thu finished his 800m surface after 6min 38.77sec, just 3.93sec slower than the gold medal winner Park Chan-ho of South Korea.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News